


His Hollow Stop

by Elise_Davidson



Category: Scrubs
Genre: Challenge Prompt: Can't Stop, Challenge Response, M/M, One of My Favorites
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-28
Updated: 2013-12-28
Packaged: 2018-01-06 10:46:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,263
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1105882
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elise_Davidson/pseuds/Elise_Davidson
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>JD calls "endgame".  Perry tells him that neither of them are a dungeon master, but feels like a dragon is eating him from the inside out.</p>
            </blockquote>





	His Hollow Stop

"This needs to stop."

Perry looked up from his positioning on the couch, tossing the remote behind his head as JD stood there, his stance firm and square, unwavering and solid. He frowned at the younger man as he got to his feet and swiped his nose. JD still didn't move or flinch. His hands were jammed in his pockets and his gaze was steady.

"What's got to stop?" Perry asked, even though he damn well knew what JD was talking about.

JD still didn't blink or move. "You know what I'm talking about. This…this thing we've been doing. We can't keep doing this; it's got to _stop_."

Perry narrowed his gaze at him. "If it ain't broke, don't fix it." Then he flopped back down on the couch.

"You always do this; you always take the decision away," JD finally snapped, the anger filtering through his casual frame. It made him seem more imposing than normal.

Perry was used to intimidation of all sorts, everything from the father-son type to the boss-employee rendition, and so he didn't move from the couch, nor did his face indicate any type of acknowledgement.

"Watching television," he reminded JD in a bored tone.

JD sighed and dropped his hands to jam them in his pockets again. "Elliot and I are getting married," he finally said.

Perry looked up, and, quite suddenly, his features had shifted to something more cutting. "So you want this to stop because you and Barbie are officially tying the knot on your will-they-won't-they relationship? How far along is she?"

JD glared at him. "What, you think it had to be a shotgun-hoedown wedding for her to say yes?"

"You said it, I didn't."

"Forget this. It's over," JD finally said tiredly, sick of fighting, sick of justifying. "I'm getting married; you're still with Jordan. We're just going to go back to the way things were."  His hands are out of their pockets again, moving with emotion and frustration; the need is lost between the two.

"They were never anything to begin with," Perry muttered, even though real hurt and emotion were starting to weave an expected, nauseous course through his lower stomach. "We weren’t anything anyway.”  It came out more petulantly at the end than the edge and anger he had been trying for.

JD snorted at that. "I don't believe it for a second; you do what you have to do so you can sleep better at night." He finally dropped his hands, fully relaxing for the first time since he'd come in. "I'm calling it quits; it's over. It's endgame."

"Pick that up from your dungeon master? If it's over, then get the hell out," Perry snapped at him. "Don't stand there pretending like this is some big fat high school relationship where we swore our undying love till the end of the night. Just get the hell out."

JD nodded. "Bye then." He couldn't think of anything else to say, he could hardly think at all. This was the right thing to do, this had to stop. Something had to break if it was going to work with Elliot this time.

Perry finally sat up again after JD had left and ran a hand through his hair. He couldn't explain the sudden gut-twisting feeling that currently had his stomach in knots, nor could he tell himself he didn't want to go after him. He sat still on the couch, because no _way_ was he going to go chasing after JD.  _No.  Fucking.  Way._

JD stood outside of the door, finally letting his calm breathing drop to shallow, deep breaths that didn't give him the oxygen he craved. His hands finally started shaking and his knees threatened to buckle. It really was _over_. He pushed away from the door, willing his feet to take him away from the doctor's lounge and, forced himself to smile when he ran into Elliot in the hallway, as he pretended that her kiss felt good.

But goddamn, Perry hadn't _stopped_ him. It really had been nothing. An eight-year-nothing.

JD shook his head to clear it and went on to his next patient, anything to bury the need to go running back to Perry, anything to quash the want for him.

Perry didn't leave the doctor's lounge for quite some time, but finally did because his break had been over for more than twenty minutes and someone was paging him. When he finished pronouncing the patient, he stalked over to the nurse's station, holding Denise by the ear, and proceeded to show her how to take the counter's heart beat.

Carla raised an eyebrow. "And I thought you liked that one," she said when it was done and over with.

"Not if she's going to be an idiot," Perry muttered. "We haven't good interns here since Dorian and Reid came through. Hell, even Murphy finally shaped up."

"It'll be sad to see JD go," Carla mused, handing Perry a chart. She jumped when the metal clipboard unexpectedly hit the ground and Perry ducked down to grab it before she could see his face. "He's transferring to St. Vincent's, didn't he tell you?"

Perry swallowed hard against the lump of rage in his throat. "He might've mentioned it. You know how Susie gets her knickers up in a twist and just babbles on and on and on and—"

Carla waved him off as he continued, and went back to work.

XXXXXXXXXXX

_This has to stop. I'm calling it quits; I'm calling endgame._

The words kept ringing in Perry's head as the shift progressed, and his mood didn't lighten either. By the end, he couldn't force himself to be certain of his feelings over it anymore, couldn't pretend that it hadn't affected him at all.

_It does._

The lie tasted horrid to his own ears as he muttered that he didn't care JD was leaving; their thing was over. Hell, maybe it had been over for a long time, and JD was just officially ending it.

_Liar._

Perry washed his face in the bathroom quickly, trying to push down the edgy nerves that threatened to pulse his nervous system into over excitement. Hell, the kid had just _now_ applied for the transfer; it meant nothing, for at least several months.

He couldn't bring himself to lie about the fact that it felt like JD was already gone.

XXXXXXXXX

_We were never anything to begin with. Just get the hell out._

JD shook his head to clear the words away, trying to focus on sleep enough to actually get there. The pillows felt hot beneath his face, the blankets too heavy and warm. All he wanted to do was slip into slumber for the night and forget that anything had _ever_ happened with Perry all together.

_It did happen._

He turned over underneath the covers, and began to debate a cup of warm milk or tea. Elliot swore by both of those. He hated milk. He sighed again beneath the covers and restlessly shifted underneath them. The conversation kept playing itself; he'd tried really hard to just lose himself in the patients. He'd ended up calling Kim about a transfer by the end of the night. Getting away from Perry would fix things far more easily than sticking around to get over him. He'd learned that the hard way with Elliot.

_Still didn't learn._

JD sighed and finally got up to get a glass of water. Elliot was visiting her family in Connecticut to tell them the good news and she had given him the keys to the house for the week. He ran a hand through his limp hair and tried to calm down, tried to just relax. It wasn't easy, not with the memories of Perry running through his head and taunting him to just keep things the way they were.

JD drank the water with heavy-lidded eyes, and wondered if maybe, just _maybe_ , he could finally sleep. Rain had begun to pour outside, making a dull thrum against the roof and creating a constant hum that he thought he could use for white noise. There was a low rumble of thunder that accompanied the rain too, and JD finally decided he could try to go to sleep now.

Fuck, he was gonna have to take off some of those damn blankets though. Elliot seemed to have a million of them on the bed; she cited that she was always cold. He'd believe it too; she couldn't seem to fix the underweight/poor circulation issues she had.

The rain lulled him a bit, almost enough that his eyes were sliding closed. He was nearly there too, when the loud knock reverberated through the house and echoed all the way upstairs on the old walls.

JD shot straight up, already alert again and turning bleary eyes to the door. He grabbed a pair of jeans and threw them on as he walked down the stairs, not bothering to button them. It was only nine at night, but he'd figured a good early turn-in was the way to go after today.

And Turk _did_ owe him a pan full of Carla's sugar-free lava brownies.

JD smirked at that, the first real half-smile he'd had all day, and turned on the porch light as the knock sounded again.

"Alright, alright, I'm coming!" JD called out, flipping on the living room light as well. Another rumble of thunder sounded through the house, making the windows rattle slightly, and JD opened the door.

He was surprised, to say the least, to see Perry standing there, soaking wet and his curls lying limply across his forehead.

"Perry? What are you doing here?" JD asked cautiously, immediately trying to firm up his stance and features again.

Perry only looked at him quietly; it was a look that JD wasn't accustomed to seeing on the older man's face. It made him look almost… _vulnerable_ , but JD would cut his own tongue off before he said that out loud.

Perry also looked fidgety though, his hands restlessly twitching at his sides as his mouth opened and shut several times, as if he couldn't find the words he wanted to say.

"I can't _stop_."

JD barely had time to frown before Perry charged towards him and grabbed his face into his hands for a long, hard kiss that was soaked with fresh rain and coffee. Perry kicked the door shut behind him, his fingers shaking against JD's skin and his shirt wet and dripping to the floor.

JD yanked back once, only to be pulled in for another kiss. So he jerked back again. "Perry, this has got to stop; we can't keep doing this!"

Perry stared at him though, blue eyes looking more gray. He appeared uncomfortable again, uncertain and almost scared in a way, but still just as intimidating as JD had ever known him to be. His shoulders were tense and hunched, and he slid a hand past JD's cheek and over his neck.

"Don't do this," JD suddenly said harshly, his breath finally hitching against the familiar touch of Perry's rough hands.

Perry stared at him a little more certainly now, as if knowing the effect he was having made his movements more confident.

"Newbie, just…" Perry dropped off again and yanked JD back to him for another kiss, hands racing over the younger man's thin t-shirt and battling with the emotions that ran through him like flooding rivers of things he couldn't think to say. "I don’t _want_ to stop," he finally said again, his voice more jagged and broken, desperation lining the low tones.

JD seemed to finally give in, his own hands shaking as they rose to tangle into Perry's hair, lips brutally forcing onto the older man's and drinking the tremble that ran over them both. The intensity from the kiss alone, the entire day, was palpable and forceful as Perry backed JD into a wall, hands coming to grip him at the hips.

"I _need_ this; I can't _let_ you take—" Perry tried again, but the words still wouldn't burble up, and he felt stupidly like a fish trying to breathe air. It just wasn't happening, but he knew he needed to force them out, make them come to the surface. He couldn't lose this.

And that tasted just fine to his ears, not like the stale lies he'd been eating all day.

"I can't lose this," Perry finally whispered quietly against JD's ear, rocking his larger body against JD's. "I just…I can't."

JD nodded against him solemnly, but his hands shook as he ran them through Perry's hair, stroking the skin of his neck and running back up again.

"We'll make it work," JD finally said after a moment, and Perry pulled back to look at him skeptically. "Because I need this too."

"Make it work how?" Perry asked, obvious disbelief in his tone.

JD shrugged, as if this fact were unimportant. "We just…we…we will. This _has_ to work." He raised his eyes back to Perry's, staring for a long moment before he spoke again. "I can't stop either.  I…” His tone was more broken now as their foreheads pressed together.  “ _I don’t want it stop either_.”

Perry crushed him into another kiss in response. The twisting turns of his stomach were finally coming to a halt, his skin finally quit feeling like it'd rip if someone touched it. And finally, eventually, his hands stopped shaking, and JD's muscles finally seemed to really relax.

They'd make it work. They had to.

xxxFINxxx


End file.
